n their fast-sailing _sampans_ (a superior sort of canoe,
peculiar to the place), they go out ten, fifteen, and even twenty miles,
to meet any ship that may be signalized as approaching the harbour. They
are usually employed to attend a ship during her stay here, few masters
choosing to trust their crews on shore in boats. Of late years, reports
have been in circulation of a suspected connection between the
sampan-men and the Malay pirates in the neighbourhood; but I question
their having any foundation in fact. Those Malay families whose young
men are thus employed as _sampan_-men, are called _Orang-Laut_, or
"People of the sea," from their living entirely afloat. The middle of
the river just opposite the town of Singapore, is crowded with boats
about twenty feet long by five wide, in which these poor people are
born, live, and die. They are wretched abodes, but are preferred, from
long custom I fancy, by their inhabitants, who, if they chose, could
find room on shore to build huts that would cost less than these marine
dwellings.

Each different class of the inhabitants of the Island have their own
place of worship. The English Church, built in 1836 by a contribution
from the Government and a subscription among the European inhabitants,
is a handsome building in a central situation, capable of holding four
times as many people as are likely to be ever collected within it: it is
neatly fitted up, but lacked a steeple, or even a belfry. This
deficiency, however, is about to be supplied by a subscription raised at
the suggestion of the Bishop of Calcutta, during his last official visit
to this portion of his immense diocese.[7]

[Footnote 7: Since this was written, the Chapel has been much
improved, and an elegant steeple added to it. There seems to be
some fatality attaching to Clergymen at Singapore. The last
three incumbents, Messrs. Burn, Darrah, and White, all died
young, and of the same complaint, namely, diseased liver. My
own opinion is, that they were all three too strict adherents
to teetotalism. In warm climates, a moderate and rather liberal
allowance of wine, I believe to be absolutely necessary.]

The Chinese pagoda is a splendid building, according to the celestial
taste in such matters, and is really well worth seeing: the carving and
general fitting-up of the interior are very beautiful, and substantial
enough to make one believe they will last a thousand years, as the